How to Water a Lawn

When watering a lawn, use a hose attached to a sprinkler every five days to avoid evaporation or over-watering. Water a lawn properly with tips from a landscaper in this free video on gardening and lawn care. View Video Transcript

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Bill Elzey

Video Transcript

Hi, I'm Bill Elzey, with Showplace Lawns. Today, we want to talk about watering the lawn. Watering is very important, especially in areas that get very little rainfall. The best way to do this, is to water infrequently. A good idea would be once a week. Ideally, it would be once every five days. Some places have different types of water restrictions, and they will tell you what that schedule is. A two day watering plan a week, will work, if you water less the first day, and more the second. The reason for this is, you want the water to go down, past the root system. Have the root go look for the water, so an infrequent watering schedule, but long periods of watering when you do, is the best way. Again, once every five days, is ideal. Once a week is good. When the grass starts to dry a little bit, look like it needs water, that is the best time to water the lawn, because it will absorb more moisture that way. You want to be careful in what you use, because you can lose water to evaporation, if you're not using the right equipment. For a hose in sprinkler, one of these types is the best. It puts out a big heavier drop ,which is what you want to eliminate the evaporation, and as one heavy drop hits the next heavy drop, it sort of has that hammer effect, of driving the water into the ground. Another good one would be one of these pulsating sprinkler types, or as some people refer to them, as the golf course sprinklers. They rotate around, and put out that same heavy pressure. That is the best way to do that. These wavers, like this, are convenient, but you lose a lot of water to light mist and evaporation. You don't get the water penetration on the ground. If you are hand watering with the hose, a fitting similar to this would work as well, because of the heaviness of the water that it puts out. Those are the best ways to water the lawn. If you have an automatic sprinkler system, and can do this, a head very similar to this would work, instead of the pop ups that just spray, because you want to get water out that's heavy, and drive it into the ground. The less you water, but the longer you water during that time, the better to extend the root system of the grass, which in turn builds a deeper water holding capacity, for all plants with really deep root systems are the best, and can withstand environmental conditions.